My mom is a hard-core Washington Post reader. This is often to my advantage because she keeps me in the loop and wow did she find a fun thing this time. It's a website called
Bookcrossing and the article about it is
here, I found it really interesting. The idea is that instead of giving your old books to the thrift store or throwing them away, you "release" them into the wild with a special ID code that you create online. If the people who pick them up choose to, they can go online and record and entry in that book's "journal." Then they release them again. I've read that about 10% or so of the books that you release get some kind of response, making it certainly a hit-and-miss sort of thing, but an exciting thing nonetheless.
I released my first book last Friday :)
It was a duplicate copy of a book that I really loved called
Gift From the Sea.
We were camping and I took it to the women's restroom in the loop where we were camping. I placed it here:
If you click on it you can read the note I put on the front.
When I came back an hour later with
Sheely, it was gone :)
14 comments:
What a fabulous idea! I just got home yesterday from vacation...it would have been a perfect place to "release" a book.
Thanks for passing this along.
I'm thinking of giving this a try. Keep us posted!
I joined Book Crossing years ago. Ironically, the first book I picked up was Gift From The Sea. I dropped a few books, one even went to Italy. Most however I never heard about again. It was fun but I did not keep up with it for long.
Very fun! That sounds a little crazy, and I'm not sure I would pick up one of those books. I'm not sure why . . .
I Love that idea!! I may have to do that too :)
I'm a bookcrosser, its great when your books get found - there are places called OBCZs were businesses - usually coffee shops, allow us to create a small shelf to leave books on for others to pick up, this way gets more responses.
I also send mine across the world to other bookcrossers, its great to see how many places they go
That is awesome, Cor. I couldn't help but think, since I'm your uncultured friend, that even with a Ziploc bag that book is still 'flagged' now. (If you don't know the reference, it's Seinfeld. Look it up.)
How fun! I know I would love to stumble upon a free book, and I would definatly be loving to pass that along! How fun! Thanks for the post!
I joined Bookcrossing a while ago, but it kinda fell aside as just one more online thing to keep up with. I do like the idea of leaving books at the campground though, so might have to start doing that.
Welcome to Bookcrossing! I'm a fan of it myself--I've left books at rest stops, on the ferry, at the gym, at professional conventions, and of course I've sent them to people or bookcrossed to friends. Haven't heard feedback from most of my wild releases, but Bookcrossers are forever reporting books that have been in teh wild for years turning up randomly halfway across the world.
I met my husband through Bookcrossing. No wonder I'm a fan.
I've heard of bookcrossing but didn't realize that's how it worked. I've let books go before with a little note saying the book is free--it would be fun to see a response about the release! Thanks for sharing, Corinne.
Been Bookcrossing for years. I would have thought you knew all about it. It is really cool.
This is one of the coolest things I seen. I am excited to get my first book!! Thanks for sending it out.
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